Plea deals accepted in death of 17-year-old pregnant farm worker (remember Maria's story?)

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110310/A_MEDIA03/110309878

Video By: Pool video courtesy News 10
Edited By: Tara Cuslidge
Published March 10, 2011 12:01 AM

Video at link.

A San Joaquin County Superior Court judge ruled March 9 that two company officials of now-defunct Merced Farm Labor will serve no jail time in connection with the death of 17-year-old pregnant farm worker Maria Isavel Vasquez Jimenez, despite two days of protests from her family and United Farm Workers supporters. Protesters, including a family member of the teen, pledged to take their fight to the state Capitol.


https://secure.ufw.org/page/contribute/sacro311

Help outraged farm workers go to Sacramento to demand justice

It's official. Farm workers’ lives are not worth much in the courts of justice in California. On Wednesday, a Stockton, Calif. judge accepted a plea deal letting criminal defendants escape any jail time for the 2008 heat death of pregnant 17-year old farm worker Maria Isavel Vasquez Jimenez.

Farm workers are outraged. They know what the decision the judge made means for them. It means there is no justice in the fields, and that growers and contractors can continue to do what they want and not go to jail.

Can you help them fight back? One hundred farm workers want to go to Sacramento next Tuesday to lobby for a bill that was just passed by the Senate Labor and Industrial Relations Committee yesterday. The Fair Treatment for Farm Workers Act (SB 104- Steinberg) or "Majority Sign-Up Legislation" will give farm workers a tool to enforce the laws designed to protect them, because it is obvious the state of California cannot protect farm workers.

To do this, however, there are expenses. Transportation and food alone for two busloads of farm workers will cost $4,734 or $45.52 per worker. Can you make a donation to help workers get on the bus?
Rosalba Flores explains, "I want to come and lobby on March 15 to continue to support Maria Isavel so that we continue to seek justice in her case and for all farm workers. I believe that the laws designed to protect farm workers have failed Maria Isavel and continue to fail all of us. It is clear to me that the laws are more favorable to the growers instead of the farm workers. On March 15 I want to ask the legislators to help us so that we can protect ourselves and our rights. We hope that you can offer a small donation so that my co-workers and I can come to Sacramento to fight for our rights and so we can prevent tragic heatstroke deaths like Maria Isavel’s."
Isabel Rojas continues, "To make matters worse, it was degrading that her employers were able to get probation for her death. She died and they get probation??!! They should have been punished more severely. Is a farm worker's life not valued?"
Jose Alfredo Ramos adds, "I am very interested in going to Sacramento with the union so that we can ask those in charge to take a stand, to change the laws and make them fair to us farm workers in California. We don't want to continue to die in the fields when we are forced by unscrupulous farmers to work in extreme temperatures. Just like Maria Isavel Vasquez Jimenez was left to suffer in the heat and ultimately die."

Please help farm workers get legislation that would make it easier to protect themselves. The state failed Maria Isavel. They failed at least 14 other farm workers who have died of heat illness since 2004, and they failed so many other farm workers who can’t get water, shade or rest. We know the budget-ridden State of California cannot put enough money into the ALRB or CalOSHA to protect farm workers and enforce the laws on the books. And now we also know we cannot rely on the court system to fix the problem. It's time for farm workers to have a tool where they can protect themselves. That's what workers plan to tell their elected representatives on Tuesday.

Could you help one worker get on the bus with a donation of $45.52? Or even sponsor two or three workers?
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[Mnemosyne]

1. For Maria. K&R n/t